PalmSource to develop Linux version of Palm OS

"Palm OS developer PalmSource said Wednesday that it will create a Linux version of the Palm OS. The company announced it is acquiring China MobileSoft Limited (CMS), which has been developing a version of the Linux operating system for mobile devices. In a statement, PalmSource said the acquisition indicates the direction in which it is moving," reports Mobile Pipeline News.

"This is the next stage in our growth and a major milestone for the mobile phone industry," PalmSource CEO David Nagel said in a statement. "We plan to offer the ease-of-use and flexibility that Palm OS is known for to all mobile phones. We believe the combination of PalmSource, CMS and Linux gives us the technological and market critical mass to compete with even the biggest proprietary operating system companies."

FYI: PalmSource has published some open letters to Palm users and the Linux community here, in PDF form. However, it has also added HTML versions of the letter to Palm OS users, the Linux letter, and the FAQ.

Comment: PalmSource's approach is much like Apple's, which may not be surprising since PalmSource is run by an ex-Apple guy. In sum, it is not making its proprietary system open source, it is sticking it on top of Linux (or, in Apple's case, BSD Unix).

Specifically, PalmSource is sticking Palm OS 6 (Cobalt) on top of Linux, and will continue to sell both the old Palm OS 5 (Garnet) and current OS 6 separately. Since Cobalt appears to have no users (well, PalmOne hasn't adopted it), this presumably won't cause much disruption.

This is probably a good move, since Palm OS is losing market share, Sony -- one of its biggest backers -- has dropped its PDAs outside of Japan, and PalmOne has reportedly been considering Windows Mobile. Palm OS already looks like the weakest player in a market that is dividing between Symbian and Microsoft.

However, it may be too little, too late. If Palm hadn't been seduced by the splendour of BeOS then it might already have a Linux-based OS 6.

Also, it must be said that various companies -- including Sharp -- have already tried offering Linux on PDAs and they have all flopped. This doesn't mean PalmSource's Linux-based OS 7 (or whatever) will fail, but that success is not guaranteed.